The Monuments Men

Léo van Puyvelde
( 1882-1965 )

Belgian art historian, professor, and museum curator Léo van
Puyvelde was born in Sint-Niklaas, Belgium in 1882. A student of Flemish
philology, he became an expert on the renowned Flemish poet Albrecht
Rodenbach while pursuing his doctoral degree at the Catholic University
at Louvain. In 1912, he began what would become a long and successful
career as a lecturer and professor of art history. In addition to his
position as Chair and Professor at the Higher Institute for Art History
and Archaeology of the University of Ghent, he was a popular visiting
professor to students around the globe. His lectures on seventh-century
painting, medieval art and archeology, and the Renaissance were heard by
students in Paris in 1932, Algiers in 1933 and even Princeton, Harvard
and Yale in the United States in 1939.

During his lifetime, van Puyvelde was regarded as one of Belgium’s foremost art experts. When
restorers at the ancient Abbey of Ghent uncovered an ensemble of
fourteenth-century murals in 1924, his expertise was utilized to examine
them. His in-depth study of the important discovery was published in
1925. He also served as chief curator at The Royal Museums of Fine Arts
of Belgium, where he established the museum’s first art conservation
laboratory.

During World War II, van Puyvelde joined the
Belgian Military Mission with the rank of lieutenant colonel. In April
1944, the Conference of Allied Ministers of Education in London
established the Inter-Allied Commission for the Protection and
Restitution of Cultural Materials, better known as the Vaucher
Commission. Together, representatives from China, France, Greece,
Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, the United States, Britain, and
Belgium cooperated to collect and organize information regarding Nazi
looting. As Belgium’s Director General of the Administration des
Beaux-Arts, van Puyvelde was chosen to lead the Belgian committee. He
compiled lists of artworks looted from Belgium, as well as lists
containing useful contact information for local experts in the field.
This information was transmitted to the MFAA for the use of Monuments
Men in the field and greatly expedited their recovery of Belgian works
of art.

Unable to remain on the sidelines, van Puyvelde was
also active in the field. He took into custody the contents of the
repository found in Amel, Belgium on behalf of the Belgian Government
and liaised closely with Maj. Ronald E. Balfour and Maj. Paul
Baillie-Reynolds, Monuments Men working in Belgium. The dramatic
discovery by Monuments Men Capt. Robert Posey and Pfc. Lincoln Kirstein
of Jan van Eyck’s Ghent Altarpiece, Belgium’s
greatest artistic treasure, deep inside a salt mine in Altausee,
Austria spurred van Puyvelde into action. However, by the time he and
his associate, Emile Langui, reached Altaussee, preparations to
transport the priceless work of art to the Munich Central Collecting
Point were near complete. Underscoring his eagerness, van Puyvelde
arrived at the mine without authorization and was turned away.

In August 1945, he was proudly on hand to welcome the Ghent Altarpiece to
the museum, where it was placed on temporary display before its return
to Saint Bavo Cathedral in Ghent. When he at last retired from his
position as chief curator of The Royal Museum of Fine Arts of Belgium in
1948 after a long and successful career, van Puyvelde’s colleagues and
students honored him in the book Miscellanea Léo van Puyvelde.